This invention relates to a method and apparatus for handling preprinted signatures such as magazines or the like and more particularly to an automated system which includes the on-line printing of personalized information onto materials to be inserted within a finished magazine. The system also provides for on-line printing of information onto the magazine cover or onto materials adhered thereto such as the address label. The system provides for a momentary interruption in the conventional preprinted signature handling system in order to introduce special material for personalized printing, such as cards, into the signature flow in order to utilize an on-line printing device, which may be the conventional on-line label printing device.
In the following specification and claims, it is to be understood that the word "signature" includes any material assembled therefrom, including but not limited to, magazines, journals, periodicals, catalogs, directories, books and pamphlets.
There is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,917,252 assigned to the Assignee herein, a method and apparatus which enables a magazine publisher to provide different issues of a magazine containing different combinations of advertising for different subscriber groups. This is accomplished by causing the magazine to be made up from different combinations of signatures for different groups of subscribers. Operation of that system is controlled from stored information based on known subscriber data. This system may also be used to prepare the subscriber's mailing label as that same subscriber's magazine is being made up.
In U.S. Pat. No. 3,819,173 assigned to the Assignee herein, there is disclosed a system which, in addition to producing different magazines for different subscribers, includes off-line or "beside-line" means for punching and/or printing and inserting subscription renewal cards or the like for selected individual subscribers as the subscribers magazine is being made up.